Don't have a cow, Daddy-o

Apart from not quite gathering what dictionaries are for, Ms. Schopen also appears to believe that the Young People are taking English straight to hell: "Of course, language evolves, and as a word-lover I'm all for that, but it seems to be evolving in the wrong direction. Now, when people write online they use a horrible pseudo-emotional language instead of expressing themselves coherently."

One cannot say this often enough: English has been happily chugging along for about eight centuries and is doing very well thank you, without the advice or strictures of Ms. Schopen and those of her kidney who pop up in every generation to wring their hands over those barbaric and incoherent things the Young People say.

I recall how beatnik slang and those awful rock-and-roll lyrics were going to demolish English in the 1950s. I recall being in college in the 1970s when people actually used groovy non-ironically and said things like "Catch you on the flip side." Every generation generates slang, most of which vanishes from the active language, some of which lingers looking quaint, and a little of which sticks and becomes unobjectionable.

But, in addition to misunderstanding what dictionaries are for and failing to put the slang of the day in any perspective, Ms. Schopen misses the main point: She is not supposed to understand what the Young People are saying, or to like it.

Slang starts out as in-group language, separating the insiders from the outsiders, and over time it tends to seep into the general language. Once it becomes general, particularly when older people adopt it, the Young People drop it like a stone. So in writing this article, Ms. Schopen merely signals that she is progressing toward cootdom, provoking snickers among the Young People, assuming that anyone younger than fifty reads The Guardian.

What is odd is that The Guardian should provide a platform for such a pointless article instead of offering something informative about the language. They might as well publish articles complaining about the weather.